Marble Is Best Left Out Of Ships
by Lazuliblur
Summary: A collection of character snapshots focused on the Escaflowne movie. (Mostly about Celena Schezar but also includes others.)
1. Marble is best left out of ships

**Disclaimer:** Vision of Escaflowne _isn't mine. Shocking, I know._ **  
** **Notes:** _So I'm working on my old fic_ Torushina _again. It had only one chapter left to write, but I felt that the fic as a whole would benefit from a fresh coat of paint. While I do that, and to help me get back into the rhythm of things, I'll be writing little character-focused ficlets, set in the same AU-what-AU (aka movie verse plus Celena). I hope you enjoy them. If not, I'll take complaints in the usual manner. Random comments and constructive critiques are always appreciated!_ ;)

 **Summary:** _Pre-_ Torushina _. Sometimes, Celena can almost fool herself into thinking that she's home. Other times, she knows better._

* * *

Celena still counted the doors down the hall to her bedroom. The habit had formed when she had first arrived at the Legranges' country house. Despite the many moons that had since passed, it was a ritual that she had yet to let go of, a quiet reminder not to get too comfortable. That this was not her home. Up the stairs. Left. Then one, two and three.

The doors were all identical and easily mixed—aged snakewood with elegant gold-trimmed panels in finely ornamented Torushinai High Style—and Signora Aldith, the mistress of the house, insisted that they be kept shut at all times. Celena had developed a trick or two to remember which one was hers without need for counting. And if she could memorise the time it took her to walk the hallway, or learn the exact angle in which the light from the ceiling fixtures hit the crystal doorknob, or even which of the Legrange family portraits hung on the opposite wall, then surely someone who had lived their entire lives in that house could do the same.

Yet her door was open and the clothes that she had left folded on top of her bed that morning were strewn across the floor, some with obvious tears.

"Ugh, Dami, not again..."

The Legranges had been close friends of Celena's mother and Dami was their youngest daughter. She would be considered an angelic child, if not for her penchant for going into Celena's room and playing with Celena's things. Celena had given up on trying to keep track of the number of times that she had caught the seven-year-old trying on scarves and dresses in front of the mirror, with Celena's favourite dragonpearl hairpin holding up her dark curls in a poor attempt to replicate the style that Celena favoured and poisoning every canary and small mammal in the area with the stench of too much perfume. More often than not, Celena ended up joining the game. The child's sisterly fascination would have been cute, were it not for the fact that Dami tended not to take very good care of the things that she handled.

Celena turned on her heel and stomped back down the stairs to the sitting room, deriving some satisfaction from the knowledge that her young culprit would hear her coming. The Legranges were away for the day, leaving their two daughters and Celena alone at the house. She was free to make as much noise as she liked. It was the perfect opportunity to ensure that Dami learnt her lesson about entering other people's rooms and leaving them a mess.

The girl's ears would be left ringing after the scolding that Celena had been building up to. Then she would take Dami to the kitchen and see about making some makushi milk sweetshakes for the both of them. After all, there was no point in traumatising the child.

Celena burst through the double doors to find little Dami leaning against her older sister Alis on the loveseat beneath the window.

"Dami! How many times have I asked you not to..."

Celena's voice faded to nothing as she took in the details of the scene before her: Dami, leaning against Alis, chasing shadows across the ceiling with sun rays reflected off of an old tin compass. Books open on the coffee table in front of the two, yellowed pages soaking in spilled tea from a tipped cup and bearing new illustrations, courtesy of Dami's pastels kit.

The sight of it almost made Celena dizzy.

"You little monster! What have you done?!"

Alis's head snapped up at Celena's shout. Dami sprung up to her knees, but her long dress tangled around her legs and tripped her before she could move further. Celena stalked up to her and grabbed her forearm, snatching her father's beaten compass. She inspected it for damage. Fortunately, it was made of sturdier stuff than the books.

The books...

"Celena, dear," Alis called, in far too reasonable a disposition for her current mood. "What's the matter? Why are you so upset?"

The books... Her father's journal and an annotated copy of his essays on the ancient civilizations of Gaea, either one an irreplaceable volume with deep sentimental value. Of all the books that had filled the Schezar estate library, these were the two that Celena had absolutely refused to part with, even as she and her brother Allen had been fleeing the house crumbling on top of their heads during the Black Dragon Clan's first invasion of Torushina.

"Ruined... Both of them, ruined..."

"Those old things? Were they yours?" Alis looked at Dami. Her younger sister was biting her lip, refusing to look up as she squirmed, trying to free herself from Celena's grip. Her guilt was plain. "Dami, you should know better than to take Celena's things. We've talked about this before. But, Celena, there's no need to be so upset. You're welcome to my father's library. There are plenty of other books there."

Celena glanced at the shelves lining the walls of the adjacent room, metrically filled with colour-synchronised bookcovers from floor to ceiling. She had perused them before and knew that they contained hundreds of literary classics of every nation on Gaea. From every teenage girl's favourite romance novel, _The Marble Ship_ by Perot, to the experimental poetic anthologies of the monks of Freid, it was an impressive collection, but one that meant absolutely nothing to Celena. Her passion—like her father's—lay in ancient history and archaeology. She could not count the number of hours that she had spent sitting on Leon Schezar's lap while he read to her from the two books now washed in tea. He had spent a lifetime collating what little was known on the subject and furthering research into it. His journal and his book were the culmination of his life's work. Contrary to what Alis thought, they were not interchangeable with other books.

She shook her head, reminding herself that the Legrange girls could not understand the importance of Leon's old books. Dami and Alis had no way of knowing how much they meant to Celena, personally. Despite her best efforts, however, calm was slipping through her fingers.

"It's not the same thing, Alis. You can't replace... Jeture, Dami! What were you thinking, taking my things like that? Those books weren't yours to play with! How could you?!"

The longer Celena spoke, the harder her grip on the girl's arm got. Dami was on the verge of tears.

"I'm sorry, Cousin Celena... I won't do it again..."

But Celena was beyond listening, shaking the young girl as though to make sure that her words stayed in the child's head once and for all.

"How many times have I told you now? How many times?! Leave my things alone!"

"Cousin..."

"This was all I had of my father! This compass, this journal and his research—that was it and you ruined it!"

"Celena!" Alis stood from the loveseat, ready to make Celena let go of her sister if necessary. "Let go! You're hurting her."

It was like descending back into her body after taking a leave of absence, a feeling that Celena often had when she got carried away. She released Dami to her sister's care with a faint apology. Then she slipped the compass around her neck and grabbed her books before running for the door. All thoughts of sweetshakes and of making it up to Dami afterwards nothing but a hot desert breeze that had come and died unnoticed after shaking loose a few grains of sand.

"I just... don't touch my things again, Dami. Please. They're very important to me."

Sunny afternoons in her father's study, listening to him babble in fragmented ancient dialects from behind his desk, hunched over grainy shadowgraphs. Playing with her father and Allen on the garden after a rainy day, digging for treasures beneath her mother's rose bushes and tracking mud into the sunroom. Walking hand in hand with her mother to the University to have lunch with her father after his morning classes. Reading quietly at the back of the classroom. Playing with old bones in his office. Listening to him describe his latest expedition like a magnificent adventure.

Celena missed him so much. She missed her mother's indulgent smiles and her brother's peeved looks when he did not feel like putting up with her. She missed her home.

But she had none of those things any more. She was alone. Her father was dead, the same as her mother, and Allen was off somewhere she could not reach, having joined the Abaharaki rebels and their fight to defeat the Black Dragon. Her childhood home, if it could still be called such when all the people who had made it so were gone, was a ruin, buried somewhere underneath the giant crane that the Black Dragon had built to pierce through the heart of Torushina. If Celena ever returned there, she doubted that there would be anything left that she recognised.

Until the war ended and her broter returned, all that Celena had was up the stairs, to the left, three doors down, tucked inside a worn travel pack, behind a snakewood door that looked like all the others.

No matter how kind the Legranges had been in welcoming her and no matter how many little tricks Celena devised to make her bedroom her own, the truth remained: this was not her home.


	2. A girl in Torushina

**Summary:** _In which eleven-year-old Allen is naïve and six-year-old Celena is her father's daughter. *grin*_

* * *

It was often said that there were no actual Torushina natives. The city had been built artificially around an underground desert oasis, its location carefully selected to intersect all the major trade routes across Gaea. From the beginning, it had been designed by a group or daring entrepeneurs to become the greatest – and wealthiest – commerce centre in the world. Everybody who lived there had at some point moved in from another country.

It was a popular tale among the population, and a true one as well, originally. The merchants who descended from those first Torushina immigrants loved exaggerating it, telling their foreign clients how their true homeland was the same in an astounding act of coincidence and that, in honour of that shared heritage, they would offer them their best discount.

Celena had never liked the saying. Even as a six-year-old it had disagreed with her. She had been born in Torushina and raised in Torushina and lived there all her life. She was the real thing, a true Torushinai and proud of it. Which was why she was determined to know every corner of her city.

She already knew the streets above ground level well enough. Knowing how much she enjoyed discovering new places, her father always took her along when he visited obscure shops for research materials in other parts of the city. There was one important place in Torushina, however, that Celena had never been to, not even close, and it was arguably the true heart of the city: the underground water springs. As a professional adventurer and explorer in the making, her ignorance on this matter was unacceptable.

Celena knew where most of the entrances were located – her father had pointed them out to her before – and she and her big brother Allen were just passing one of them.

She stopped in the middle of the street, arms crossed with an impressive pout for a six-year-old. It matched Allen's irritated scowl, even given the five year advantage that he had over her.

"You know, you don't have to take me all the way home, Allen. I know where I am. You can go and meet your stupid friends."

"Right. And Mother would kill me. I told her I'd pick you up from school. I'm not leaving you on your own," he said.

But his eyes were gleaming in interest and Celena knew that if she just pushed a little she could convince him. They were very close to home now – and close to the garden where Allen and his friends gathered to play Knights and Scoundrels. Celena had never understood what was so interesting about the game. Where was the fun in a bunch of boys trying to beat each other with sticks? Somehow, Allen enjoyed it.

"The house is right there," Celena said, pointing at the tops of the blue-eaved roof that could be seen only two blocks away. "I'm not going to get lost. I can go on on my own and you can go meet your friends."

Allen was close to coming around. He looked over his shoulder at the roof that Celena had correctly identified as home, then off to the side, to the tree-tops peaking over the closely packed houses where his friends would be waiting. They had built rope bridges across the garden trees and Allen had been dying to try them out all week.

"I've walked these two blocks thousands of times before with Mother and Father, Allen."

He turned back to her. Before he had so much as opened his mouth, Celena could already see that she had won. All that was left for her to do was hold back her grin. There was no need to make Allen suspicious, when he was working so hard to keep his stern and intimidating big brother facade.

"This is how it's going to be: you'll go straight home; no extra stops and no wandering around for sightseeing, signorina! If Mother asks, I left you at the doorstep. Got it?"

"Yep!" Celena happily replied, holding her arms behind her back in the best "I swear I'm not planning anything" pose that she knew how to make. Despite her best efforts, her lips were curling up and she was bouncing ever so slightly on the balls of her feet.

"I mean it, Celena! You are to go straight home."

Apparently not as slightly as she had hoped.

"Yep. Promise," she repeated.

Happy with her response, Allen took off. He turned around only once to check on her and Celena waved him goodbye from where she stood in place. As soon as he was out of sight, she turned around herself and skipped along the nearest drinking water supply pipe extending radially across the city, following it to one of the entrances to the complex underground cave system at the centre of Torushina, exactly where her father had said it would be.

* * *

Celena pressed her knees to her chest as she sat against the rock wall. She was cold and hungry and bored and it had been days since she had seen the sun. For a child of the desert, that felt like the worst, most disheartening of all her problems.

It had been days since Celena had left Allen behind to explore the water well. At first, she had followed the pipelines, ensuring that she could find her way back out. Whenever one of the water plant crews got close – their echoing voices and footsteps gave away their presence in the enclosed space – she hid behind whichever pipe was nearest, her tiny frame a perfect fit for the dead recess between the curvature of the pipes and the bottom edge of the cave wall. No one ever saw her.

But the caves did not form a continuous path. There were multiple gaps on the floor that had to be crossed by bridge or mechanical lift. Celena had tried to traverse one of them by walking along one of the larger pipes. She had failed to account for the moisture in the cave or for how slippery the lichens that grew along the pipes actually were. She had lost her footing and twisted her ankle trying to regain her balance. Luckily, the fall had not been too great.

After that, there had been no more pipes to guide her path and she had spent hours walking back and forth, trying to find her way back to where she had been, nursing a bruised shoulder and a sprained ankle. Eventually, she had given up on keeping her presence a secret and started calling for help, but nobody ever replied.

The tunnels grew darker and darker, the longer she walked. The ambient light from the water plant's electrical installation could not penetrate so deep. She was also completely disoriented, with no way of knowing if she was approaching the exit at the centre of the city or walking further away towards the periphery. She had lost her sense of direction a long time ago, after the many dead ends that she had stumbled across. Sometimes she had to feel her way around by touch. Her stomach had been growling for hours and she was thirstier than she could ever remember being. Her mouth was as dry as if she had crossed a sandstorm without a scarf to cover her face, when finally – finally – she found new light at the end of the tunnel.

The path led her to a vast gallery, touched by natural light, though the location of its source was lost somewhere among the stalactites and other rock formations hanging from the ceiling. Most of the area was occupied by a black-watered pond – and Celena feel to her knees at the edge of it to parch her dry throat.

At first, the water had tasted divine. The lake was the most beautiful thing that Celena had ever laid eyes on. Little by little, however, a sense of wrongness overcame her. The water was too dark, the lake too big and the silence too oppressive. She had the feeling that her presence was disturbing some slumbering invisible giant.

She decided then not to touch the water unless she absolutely needed to drink. She also decided against calling out for help while in the gallery. The quiet was so unnervingly absolute that her shouts would no doubt be for nothing. There was no one there.

Inspired by a fresh burst of curiosity, Celena tried to circle the lake and see if there was anything useful on the other end of the gallery, but the path did not extend all the way around. She did find, however, her invisible giant: a painting on one of the walls of an enormous creature with bulky shoulders, surrounded by tiny figures of men. The white outlines reminded her of the stark shadowgraphs that her father used to show her from his archaeological digs in a site that was rumoured to have been inhabited by the Dragon People of old. The shape of the giant also reminded her of the statue on the shrine outside of the city. The tenuous familiarity was enough to soothe Celena's nerves.

There had been people here, once. She could not wait to tell her father all about it, once he found her and they got back to the surface.

A little further ahead, she found more drawings of the same giant, this time accompanied by a second one with pointy shoulders. Beneath the two, there was a panel filled with strange writing that Celena could not decipher. It sent her head spinning with giddy excitement. She could not wait until she was old enough to learn what it said.

She had settled there to wait until she was found. She had light and plenty of water to drink – and there was no way that she would give up her find.

The days passed and the chill of the cave settled into Celena's bones.

* * *

It started as a low-pitched murmur inside her head. Celena had been dozing when the vague impression that she was not alone woke her.

A soft hum agitated the air, a vibration travelling across the stone, though the gallery was as quiet as it had been since the day that Celena had found it. Laying both her hands on the ground, she felt it too, a kind of tremor. Not like an earthquake. There had been one a couple of months back, so she could tell that this was different. Quieter.

Then something shifted, disturbing the still waters at the same time that a familiar shout echoed across the gallery.

Celena was on her feet instantly, trying to locate where the call had come from. She would recognise that voice anywhere.

"Papa! I'm here, Papa!"

"Celena! Hey you, get the others, we found her! Celena! Are you all right, Celena? Papa's on his way!"

She had never heard her father sound quite like that, but then again, she had never been so happy to hear his voice either. She had never doubted that he would find her, but the relief that he had finally arrived was still overwhelming.

In between calling out to her father, Celena remembered the movement on the lake. She stared at the expanse of dark waters, but there was not a ripple to be found. When she laid her hands on the ground, the tremors that had woken her had also stopped.

Celena glanced at the pictures on the wall behind her. She did not particularly care about religious stories – her father's grousing that it was all bogus was far more entertaining to hear than any of her mother's devout prayers – though she knew the myths about the god that lived under Torushina as well as any native. Her mother had told them to her and Allen many times while tucking them in to sleep.

Celena had never believed them. She still didn't. As soon as her father found his way into the gallery, he would be able to tell Celena what those pictures actually meant – but a tiny piece of her felt like it wanted to believe that maybe there was something there.

She crouched on the edge of the lake, dipped her fingers into the cold water and murmured:

"Thank you for looking after me."

* * *

In the end, the cave's strange drawings and mysterious writings were lost.

The rescue team had had to blast an opening through the painted wall in order to reach the cave. Celena told her father about them, in as much detail as she could remember – though the usefulness of a description like "squiggly writing" was up for debate – but she got the feeling that he was not listening. He had cried when he first saw her, falling to his knees to hug her tight, and had refused to let go of her for a long time afterwards, carrying her all the way through the tunnels back to the surface.

Her mother and her brother had been waiting there. Allen's eyes had looked swollen and red. He had begged her for forgiveness, but Celena was not sure what for. He had not done anything. Her reunion with her mother, though, had been the hardest. As soon as Celena's eyes met hers, the six-year-old had started sobbing uncontrollably. The only reason that she had stopped crying was because she fell asleep in her mother's arms, exhaustion catching up with her at last.

Four days after her rescue, once Celena had gained back the weight that she had lost during her escapade, she had gotten the scolding of a lifetime and been made to promise never to wander off alone again. And so she promised, easily and without a fuss – keeping her fingers crossed behind her back.

The fright and the scolding notwithstanding, Celena was quite proud of her adventure. She doubted that she would ever feel completely at ease in enclosed dark places again, but overall, she regretted nothing.

She had wanted to prove that she was a true Torushinai and so she had. Now she could say that she knew the secret places of her home better than anyone.


	3. Farewell

**Summary:** _Allen leaves.  
_

* * *

Allen hesitated on his way out of the Legrange house. Celena hugged herself a bit tighter, bracing herself against whatever new thought had occurred to him.

"I promise I'll write. I'll write you every day. I'll send so many letters that you won't know what to do with them. I promise it won't be like Mother."

His eyes shone with hope, begging his little sister for acceptance, if not forgiveness, but her gaze refused to soften. If he wanted to leave her in that strange house, abandon her in that forgotten corner of Gaea while he went off to fight the Black Dragon warlords, then he could deal with her silence.

She had already said everything that she had to say—that she wanted to go with him, that she refused to be left aside, that, even though she barely knew how to hold a sword, she could make herself useful to him and the Abaharaki in other ways. He had ignored every single one of her pleas, claiming that he could not bear the thought of her being around danger. Now it was her turn to do the ignoring. Let him feel how much rejection hurt.

Allen's gaze dropped as the silence grew. He turned around, shoulders slumped, sad eyes hidden behind long blond hair, and made his way to the small group of Abaharaki waiting for him outside. Their friends' faces were the last thing that Celena saw before the door closed: Gaddes and Reeden, Pyle and Millerna, all uncharacteristically grim in the face of Allen's disappointment.

Once alone, Signora Aldith, the lady of the Legrange household, laid a hand on Celena's back. The touch startled her, as she had forgotten that there were others in the room.

"You know, child, this could be the last time in a long while that you see your brother," Aldith said.

A hot lump formed in Celena's throat that prevented her from speaking. She had been hurting and so it had only seemed fair for her to make Allen experience some of that awful feeling. At the same time, though, she was aware of how dangerous the war had become and how easily Allen might never return. Tragedy could rob Celena of her brother, her last remaining family, and she would never even know about it. It was why she had not wanted to be separated from him in the first place.

Somehow, hearing it spoken aloud in someone else's voice made it more real. It was like being hit by the first dusty winds of a desert storm that had been assumed would pass.

Allen had mentioned their mother. If there was one thing that he could never be accused of, it was that he did not know or understand how his sister's mind worked, for that was the exact direction that Celena's thoughts had taken the moment that he had conceived of this plan to keep her safe at all costs.

Their father had gone missing during an expedition to learn about the Dragon Folk of old and their mother had left Torushina to meet with the remaining members of Leon Schezar's team, to find out more about what had happened and to follow the search for her husband up close. She had wanted to be there as soon as he was located.

" _I'll let you know once I have news,_ " Encia had said, hugging Celena and Allen both on the doorstep of their home in Torushina. Her luggage had already been loaded onto a carriage and she had been wearing a plain long skirt and blouse—practical travel clothes so different from the frilled and laced gowns that she usually favoured that it almost felt like hugging a stranger. " _Allen, I want you to look after your sister. And you, Celena, be brave and be good to your brother._ "

They had all been so afraid for their father, that it never occurred to them to worry about their mother. It was the last time that either of them had seen or heard from Encia Schezar. All that Celena knew was that their mother had disappeared sometime after meeting up with the University of Torushina's archaeology team, though she had always suspected that Allen was privy to a lot more details that he refused to share.

Celena had been seven years-old then. Now, at fifteen, history was repeating itself.

She had always regretted not giving her mother a proper goodbye.

"Excuse me, Signora Aldith," Celena said, already taking the first steps towards running out the door. The old lady was more than happy to let her go without reproach.

The weather outside was dry and sunny, as it always was in that desert region. Allen stood by his horse, being comforted by Millerna while the others in the group kept busy strapping down bags and supplies to give the pair some kind of privacy.

"Allen," Celena called.

The effects were instantaneous. As though he could see straight through his little sister's head—which, after all the trouble that she had caused him over the years, she had no doubt that he could—Allen knew that her anger had dissipated and that he was forgiven. They met half-way between the Legranges' house and the Abaharaki caravan.

"I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to hurt you. Please forgive me."

The apologies flowed from both sides, accepted without hesitation and with warm smiles full of love.

"I just want what's best for you, Celena. I promise that I'll be all right. Nothing bad will happen. Gaddes and the others will be with me."

"Then I'll worry that you'll be so busy keeping them safe that you won't look out for yourself."

"Don't let them hear you say that." Allen gave her a complicit smile, touching his forehead down to hers.

Celena gripped his wrist, the same that bore his lucky prayer beads, and sent the gods a quick appeal to let her brother find his way back to her, safe and sound. She did not normally pray, so the heartfelt sincerity of the spontaneous gesture surprised even her.

"I'll think of you every day," she said.

As Allen hugged her one last time, Celena spied Millerna and the others looking their way. She waved at them from behind Allen's back and was glad when they returned it.

The entire trip to the Legranges, she had privately resented them for being allowed to stay with Allen when she could not. Millerna was not much older than her. Unlike Celena, though, she had talent with a sword and could fight for a long time without tiring. Not to mention that, as a Torushinai Princess, she had important acquaintances throughout the nations of Gaea. In contrast, Celena's endurance was best measured by how long she could sit still while reading a book and the members of noble families that she was most familiar with were deceased some four centuries past.

It felt good to part on good terms with Millerna and the others now, like shedding a heavy, unwanted mantle that she had not realised she carried.

Allen's embrace came to an end sooner than Celena would have liked, but, at this point, there was no finite length of time that would have satisfied her. The siblings locked gazes and Celena gave Allen a determined nod—permission and blessing for his departure.

The group finished tying down blankets and provisions. The horses were well loaded and shuffled under the weight on their backs as the riders mounted. From there, they had a long way to go until regrouping with the main Abaharaki convoy.

Celena stayed outside until there was no more sign of them on the horizon.


	4. Of questions asked

**Summary:** _The Abaharaki intercept a Black Dragon Clan message._

* * *

Pulling a curtain of heavy fabric aside, Celena entered the tent where the group of rebels she and her brother had recently joined had gathered. Allen and the Abaharaki were planning their strategy. No one noticed her arrival, though, as Reeden chose that exact moment to slap his hand on his knee.

"Damn it!" he cried.

Night was already falling. They had spent the day gathered around a table, trying to decipher a mysterious letter that they had intercepted from a Black Dragon Clan courier. Presumably, it contained details of Folken's next attack, but it was written in a strange code that none of them could decipher.

Gaddes was off to the side, sipping vino. Ort and Katz were elbow deep in Millerna's book collection, looking for some clue that might help crack the message. Millerna herself was in her private tent with Pyle, searching the rest of her books. Kio was preparing dinner and staying out of the way as much as possible. Like him, many of his companions wished that they had listened more closely to their elders' lessons and taken the time to learn how to read. Allen, sat next to Reeden, took his turn examining the letter.

Kio covered the pot where the stew was cooking and moved closer to pass Reeden a glass of vino.

"It's all right, Reeden. We'll figure it out," he said, patting the other's shoulder.

"Sorry, guys, I really thought I had it," Reeden said. "The characters looked just like the ones we use in Arzaean but when you put them all together they don't make any sense. Like, this here says 'the sun and moon breaks three sands'? And that's already if you stretch the meaning."

The group had hoped that they had finally gained access to Folken's secrets when Reeden had jumped up from his doze in the corner with a triumphant "Hey, that means 'horse'!" Now, three hours later, they were doing what they could to keep Reeden from seeing how deep their disappointment ran.

The Abaharaki had been experiencing a streak of back luck, with defeat after defeat. Retrieving this letter was the first victory that they had been able to claim in months.

Allen leant over the letter, comparing it side to side with Reeden's translation.

"It is odd," he said. "Are you sure you got this right, Reeden? Could the words have a second meaning to them?"

"Nah, Boss," Reeden said before gulping down his vino in a single shot. The nickname slipped easily from his lips. It was becoming truer every day. "I mean, the words aren't exactly the same as you'd write them in Arzaean, but then again I learnt them from my Pa's pottery. He used to paint them on jars and things, but change them a little to make them prettier."

Allen read the nonsensical text that Reeden had come up with and leaned back against his chair. Trying to make sense of it was making his head hurt.

"Any other ideas, anyone? Gaddes?" Allen asked.

His friend answered by grimacing and shrugging. Then he glanced jealously at Reeden, who was having his vino cup refilled by Kio. His own mug was drained.

"Ort? Katz?" were next on Allen's roll call.

The pair put up their empty hands. Nothing in Millerna's books came close to matching the strange writing of the letter.

The tent flap opened again to admit Millerna and Pyle. All heads turned towards the newcomers this time. Their walk was brisk and they were carrying a sheaf of papers that stirred the group's hopes.

"Give it here," Millerna told Allen.

She hastened through the notes she had taken, sheet after sheet. After comparing them with the Black Dragon's missive up close, however, her shoulders slumped. She unknowingly copied Reeden.

"Damn it."

There was a collective sigh from the group. There went the last of their hopes.

Allen stood and offered Millerna his chair.

"It's all right, Princess." Addressing the rest of the room, he added, "This is not our loss. Folken's messenger failed to deliver this message, so one of his Captains will not be receiving his orders. Even if we don't know what it says, our actions have already disrupted the Black Dragon's plans. This is a victory for our cause!"

The cheers that answered him were not as enthusiastic as he had hoped.

"Gaddes, do we still have those barrels of ale that we got from Sasu?"

"Sure do, Boss. If Pyle managed to keep to himself, that is," Gaddes replied, raising his empty mug to salute what he saw as a fine idea in the making.

"Oi!" Pyle complained. He soon forgot to be offended in favour of laughing along his friends though. "I can't say it wasn't tempting!"

"And, Kio, how's that stew?" Allen asked next.

"Thanks to Ort's fine hunting, we have enough for everyone and then some. The meat is real tender, too."

"Then let's celebrate to our success! The Black Dragon has tried to crush us under its heel. Today we showed them that we can push back and we will continue to do so for as long as it takes until Folken is defeated. To freedom!"

This time the answer suited Allen's fervour. A dappled chorus of "hear hear"s rose from various corners, mixed with the ruckus of an excited crowd vacating the tent. Celena, still standing close to the entrance, moved to let them through. A smile bloomed in her face in response to the grins and cheers of the Abaharaki as they noticed her.

Allen was one of the last. He kissed her cheek in greeting.

"Coming, Celena?"

She nodded. "In a moment."

Gaddes interrupted whatever reply Allen might have made, slinging an arm around his shoulders and pushing him towards the exit after the others.

"Don't take too long, Celena, or there won't be anything left by the time you get there!"

Celena's smile grew as she watched them go. Gaddes was always one of the kindest to her. Only Kio and Katz stayed behind, ladling stew into bowls and grabbing enough cups for everyone from the wooden chest where the supplies were stored. The tent could not be called silent, but after the commotion it felt that way to Celena.

Her smile faded.

No one had thought to ask her to look at the message.

Why had Allen not done so? She tried not to read anything into it, but as soon as Reeden had mentioned Arzaean script, Allen should have asked her. Reeden's homeland was close to the location of the ancient Atlantean territories. Their culture had inherited much from that ancient civilization, their writing system included. And Celena had studied not only Arzaean under her father's tutelage, but the original Atlantean which was in its origin.

She wandered over to the crate that had served as a makeshift table and knew exactly what laid before her the moment that her eyes landed on the Black Dragon's orders. How very little surprising, she thought, that someone as arrogant as Folken would appropriate Atlantean culture for himself and use it plainly, as though its understanding were beyond the reach of any other individual.

She grabbed a pen and flipped the paper containing Reeden's translation.

 _"The Wing Goddess is coming. Prepare for her arrival. Search the desert, night and day. Your priority is to find the armour."_

After writing it down, Celena stood for a moment, contemplating its meaning.

"Wing Goddess..." she muttered to herself. Something about the name tickled an old memory, tucked away in the back of her mind. Perhaps Allen would know what it meant.


	5. A tale of two soldiers

**Summary:** _Chesta meets Gatti._

* * *

Chesta has been with Folken's army for a little over a week when he meets Gatti for the first time. His first impression of him is that he is quiet and friendly, if a little shy. Adjusting to the Black Dragon Clan's rigid structure and trying to find out where he belongs in the midst of it, just like Chesta.

"Excuse me," Gatti says, his politeness at odds with the scorched outskirts of the city that their siege has occupied, "do you know where the barracks of the third squadron are?"

Chesta only knows the answer because he has been staying with the second squadron.

"Go left at the end of this road," Chesta says. Gatti's lips move, committing the words to memory by soundless repetition. "The banners in front of the tents are numbered."

"Thank you." Gatti's eyes don't quite rise to meet Chesta's. He looks around them, then points down the road that Chesta had indicated. "That way?"

"That's right. And then left," Chesta repeats when the confusion does not quite leave Gatti's eyes. "Are you new around here?"

The question goes unanswered, but Chesta senses no ill will in it. Gatti is just too focused to have heard him as he walks down the road, repeating the directions under his breath.

* * *

Chesta crosses paths with him again at the hospital the following week.

The General that Emperor Folken has assigned him to advise is happiest ignoring Chesta's existence and, since Chesta does not know what to do with free time, the young seer falls back on his old temple routines: meditation, study, physical labour. The medics are glad for the extra pair of hands when he visits, helping to spread sand to keep the floors from becoming slippery or replacing the sheets on the used cots. Refina, the Lieutenant in charge of the medical crew even lets him assist with the simpler treatments. She insists that he is too young to observe the more serious cases, though, so she sends him away during the periods of greatest affluence.

On his way out, he sees Gatti sitting by the door, staring down at his hands.

Chesta has been wary of making friends since arriving at the camp, and especially since he had started working at the hospital. The monks would have preached against the temptations of worldly attachments. Chesta just opposes the fact that a great deal of soldiers who go into the hospital never leave of their own power. He stops anyway.

"Hey," Chesta says. The other gives no response. "Remember me?"

Gatti looks up. He searches Chesta's face, but long seconds pass before he answers.

"You're…" He frowns. "I asked you where the barracks were the other day."

"That's me," Chesta confirms with a smile. "My name's Chesta."

"I'm Gatti." His voice is warm, but there is something expectant about his stare. Chesta thinks that he looks like he is waiting to be told how to feel about this new person approaching him. Chesta finds it peculiar, but does not let it keep him from taking the seat next to him.

"So what are you doing here?"

Gatti turns his face until Chesta has a view of the ear furthest from him. The skin of the neck around that area is red and blistered, a fresh burn that extends lower, beyond the collar of his shirt.

"I deserved it, really," he explains ruefully. "I missed the wake up call and was late for drills. The Sergeant wasn't happy." The smile slides off his face. "I'm not very— I don't know what to do most of the time."

"Where are you from?" Chesta asks.

Gatti is older than him and comfortable enough in his uniform to have been wearing it longer than Chesta has worn his, but Chesta knows something about adapting to new environments. The monks of his temple had sold him to Folken and, before that, his parents had sold him to the monks. He is used to being shuffled around like an unwanted spare and he knows that not all the other guys are in the army by choice either. Getting Gatti to talk about his past might do more to help him center on the present than leaving him to think about the details of his current situation.

"Fanelia," he says. He reaches into one of his pockets and pulls out a scrap of torn fabric to show Chesta. The colours have mostly faded to a uniform light brown, but somewhere in there Chesta can still make out the kind of green-and-gold geometrical design that the country had once been famous for—before Folken had taken the throne by force and razed it to the ground. "I've been with Lord Folken since the beginning but…" A smile ghosts across his face and he shrugs. It makes him look young. "The other guys all know that I'm dumb. They don't want me around, so nobody tells me what to do." He spreads the piece of cloth over his knee, patting it lovingly, and Chesta finally recognises it as a piece of a sleeve. "Do you like it? My mum made it."

His smile is so bright that it has to pull on his burns. Chesta does not comment, though.

"Gatti?" One of the medics calls. "Come on, we'll see you now."

Chesta gets up and smiles at Gatti before he can follow the medic.

"Good luck," he says. "I'm sure you'll figure it all out."

* * *

Chesta sees Gatti again frequently, now that he is looking—even in armour, Gatti stands out among his fellows. He smiles when he sees Chesta, but it is clear to the younger boy that his struggles remain from how his comrades keep him at the edges of the group. One place where Chesta does not see him again is at the hospital, and for that he is grateful. He tries to make friendly conversation, sparse as it is, whenever possible.

It becomes harder to worry about Gatti, though, once Chesta's own problems catch up with him. Word of his General's lack of results in the siege and his complaints about having a "cursed" seer under his command have reached Emperor Folken's ears and he is not pleased. As a result, the General is quietly replaced and Chesta is moved to a different unit.

The Dragon Slayers have a very different dynamic than what Chesta has experienced so far, not least of all because their leader, Captain Dilandau, seems to march to the beat of his own drum. He is demanding and not exactly friendly. There is something off about him, in the low number of troops assigned to him and in the high level of interest that Folken has in him, personally—but he does the same work that his soldiers do and he knows all of their names, which is more than can be said of the other commanders that Chesta has come across. The first order he gave Chesta was to stay alive, which he found inspiring of trust. It made Lord Dilandau a leader that he does not mind following.

He hopes that Gatti has a captain like that looking out for him.

* * *

With Chesta being put through countless drills to get him up to par on his horse riding and sword fighting skills, two months pass before he meets Gatti again. He runs into him in the one place he had hoped he would not: the hospital.

Chesta has come in to stock up on herbs for his migraines—while the previous General had wanted nothing to do with Chesta's powers, Lord Dilandau is intent on squeezing every advantage he can out of them—when he sees Gatti sitting alone on one of the cots. The left side of his face is swollen badly enough that he cannot open that eye.

"Gatti?" Chesta calls, all his worries surfacing at once.

Gatti squints his good eye. "Chesta?" His smile is crooked and grim. Unlike before with the burn, this time his pain shows very well—and also his surprise.

"Hey there," Chesta says. "Is it okay if I join you?"

Gatti bobs his head without hesitation.

"It's fine," he says.

Chesta looks around for a chair, but there does not seem to be any nearby. "Scoot over," he says.

Gatti moves at once and Chesta wonders if he is always this relieved to be given a clear instruction or just happy to see a friendly face. Either way, Chesta finds himself caring too much about the answer—and that is not something that he should be concerned about.

Maybe he has grown more comfortable than he expected to among these people, but it was soldiers like Gatti who threatened to kill the monks in his temple and laid ruin to so many others who failed to comply. The more he knows them, though, the more he sees them as ordinary people and the harder it is to muster the hate. Especially given that the monks had discarded of him as a sacrifice.

The room is quiet and mostly empty as there has been no activity on the siege lately. The smell of medicine is residual here at best. Supplies have been running low.

"Still having trouble finding your way around, then?" Chesta asks.

Gatti looks at his feet, showing Chesta the side of him that is splotchy red and yellow. The blue flames illuminating the room are unable to conquer the thickest shadows, making it look worse than before.

"It's getting better. It's when I move to a new unit that I can't keep up. Everything changes," he pauses to painfully swallow some spit. "The others don't bother me as much either. It's better."

There is something sad about the way he talks about himself, like it is not him who his comrades have beaten up or like it does not matter. Chesta tries to touch his cheek, carefully. Gatti flinches anyway.

"That must be hard to deal with."

Gatti lowers his head.

"It's all right," Gatti says, very quietly. "The Sergeant said not to fight back. to let them do what they want. He said that they'd get bored and stop, so that's what I do. The Sergeant was mad because the last time I fought back one of the others got hurt bad. I don't want the Sergeant to be mad at me, so I just do as he says. It's getting better."

"I see," Chesta says, nodding.

He had heard rumours about a scuffle among soldiers a while back that had ended with one of them getting his face pummelled into his skull. He wonders if that is what Gatti's Sergeant was mad about. Discipline is tight around the camp and serious incidents like that do not break out often, from what Chesta has seen, so it is possible. Gatti certainly has the strength for it.

It is hard for Chesta to be afraid of him, though, when Gatti just seems so lost. Gatti sounds like he does not know better, like he is desperate to have someone help and reassure him.

"You'll make it through this. We're all struggling. And if you need help, or someone to talk to, you can come to me."

Gatti's response is not what Chesta had expected it to be. He startles and turns his face the other way. He is shaking—or maybe that is only the impression that the flickering candlelight gives.

"Gatti?" Chesta says, understanding. "I mean it, okay?"

Gatti recomposes himself and, when their gazes meet, Chesta knows without resorting to any supernatural powers that Gatti believes him. He smiles.

"Thank you," Gatti says. His smile is still crooked and awkward, but true. "You are the first to—Thank you."

Chesta grabs his herbs and leaves.

* * *

Chesta reports to Ryuon, Lord Dilandau's second-in-command, the next morning with a request. He tells Chesta that he will speak to their Captain about it the next chance he gets and dismisses him. They have a mission to carry out that day, and more pressing matters to attend to than the fate of some soldier from another squad.

That evening, Chesta enters the mess hall to find Gatti waiting for him by the door. His face is less swollen now, darkened to painful shades of purple and green, but he looks different. Something has changed about his eyes. If Chesta had to name it, he would say that a sense of calm that had not been there before had settled.

They eat with the other Dragon Slayers. Their table is celebrating—that day's victory had cleared the way to conquest and the siege is at an end. In their good mood, they treat Gatti like one of their own. Chesta finds that when he does not have to talk much, Gatti fits right in, and when he does say something that the others might think of as odd, they treat him the same anyway. All of them are different and all of them come from different backgrounds. They also know better than to cause trouble because of that. Lord Dilandau has seen to that.

* * *

Ryuon is true to his word and, in no time, Gatti is officially transferred to the Dragon Slayers. Chesta helps him get to where he needs to be but, as it turns out, Gatti has a surprising amount of talent with horses. So much so that Lord Dilandau has him help the others master particular maneuvers during training. In fact, with Gatti's willingness to please and follow instructions, he and Lord Dilandau get along like a house on fire. What he is not as good at is handling a sword, but he makes up for his lack of technique with sheer brute force.

None of the other Dragon Slayers bother Gatti, but Chesta keeps an eye out anyway.

"Chesta," Gatti whispers to him one day. "Can I— Can I tell you something?"

It is very early and Chesta is wrapping up his morning session of meditation before the others get up for the day.

"Of course, Gatti," Chesta says, stretching his back. "What is it?"

Gatti tugs the old scrap of Fanelian cloth that he carries everywhere from under his pillow and gives it to Chesta.

"You can have it," he says.

Chesta is reluctant to accept. The old cloth means nothing to him and a great deal to Gatti. He takes it anyway, because he knows that it would not have been offered if Gatti was not sure that that was what he wanted.

"It was my brother's—my younger brother's," Gatti explains. Chesta, attempting to trace the fading patterns on the cloth, stops and looks up at his friend. Gatti had never mentioned having brothers before. "He's dead, but he's your age, I think. That reminds me of him."

Chesta handles the fabric with extra care now, with a touch of reverence. He thinks he knows what Gatti is trying to say and he is honoured by it. If Chesta had any brothers, he hopes that they would be like Gatti, too.

Ryuon has started kicking lazy legs out of beds and strapping on the first pieces of his armour. Their quiet moment is at an end.

"What was his name?" Chesta asks.

"Roland," Gatti says, pulling a shirt over his head, "but he insisted on Rolli." He then gets up and hurries to the bathroom, to get there before the others.

"Thanks, Gatti."

Chesta uncrosses his legs from a lotus position and walks over to the small rucksack that contains all of his belongings. He tucks Gatti's gift between the cover and the first page of his prayer book. Then he hurries after his fellow Slayers before Ryuon can get anxious.


End file.
